Bath plugs, mock-Tudor beams, dog food, light bulbs… have last week’s newspaper headlines reminded anyone else of the conveyor belt from the Generation Game?

It’s been a succession of ever more improbable items floating past leaving the impression of a multitude of things, but when the music stops you’re hazy on the details.  In this particular game, though, what matters in the end isn’t the individual items, it’s the overall implication for politics and governance.

It’s easy to get caught up in the (fascinating and sordid) details of who spent how much on what, to be insulted by the sheer cheek of it all – first that MPs (and no, not all of them, but it does seem like many) claimed for things they weren’t entitled to, and secondly that they think paying it back somehow makes it all ok.

But it’s the bigger picture that matters.

First the bankers with their bonuses and their pensions, now the MPs with their hands in the expenses drawer - could the inequalities in our society be better illustrated than by an MP paying back a cheque of higher value than the mean UK annual salary?

Over the last six months it’s felt like we’ve never been further from having a “strong, healthy and just society”, one of the core objectives of the government’s sustainable development framework.   

Underpinning those core objectives are the supporting principles: using sound science responsibly, achieving a sustainable economy and promoting good governance.  Good governance is what’s at stake here.

With all the main parties implicated in the expenses scandal we should look beyond our current government and party politics, and question how we are governed and the implications that has for our society.

What this scandal has highlighted more than anything else is the huge disconnect between the elected and the electorate: it’s more than just that MPs have committed these errors, it’s that they don’t fully understand why the public is so shocked; that they appear to think paying it back makes it ok, and that the test they have failed is not “is this right or wrong?” but “how does this look?”

In this sense the expenses scandal is the tip of an iceberg, a visible sign of the loss of trust in MPs and our political system. Falling voter turnout is another clear indicator of disillusionment. Turnout in general elections ranged from between 72% to 83% in the post-war years until 1997, then fell to a low of 59% in 2001 and 61% in 2005.

This current scandal won’t be solved by holding a general election - because with all the parties implicated who do you vote for?  - and there’s a real democratic concern about just how low the turnout can fall.  Meanwhile, with the mainstream parties all tarnished, the spectre is looming of a big vote for the BNP in the European Parliament elections on 4 June.

Under ‘good governance’ in the sustainable development framework the government talks about “Actively promoting effective, participative systems of governance, in all levels of society”.  This seems like a good starting point for a solution.

We need a radical overhaul of our democratic system to encourage voter participation and to make MPs more connected with their local community than just via their second home. Most importantly – we need to make people feel connected with those who govern them, and to make them feel that they have a stake in politics, and make them want to vote. There are countries in the world, which do this better than us, let’s learn from them.

Nothing is certain in politics, but you wouldn’t bet on Gordon Brown having a long political future from here.  He’s still got time to get something right, though, and go down in history for achieving something, which creates lasting change.  That’s much more than fiddling around with some rules on what expenses are allowable or not – it’s about radically overhauling the system, and reconnecting with the people who live in this country, not just wiping the egg off the faces of the people who currently run it.